It's cleverly observed and sometimes funny too in its own very downbeat way, as it explains just how Morrissey emerged out of his chrysalis.
Gives Morrissey and Smiths fans a dose of what life was like for the brooding musician before his days as a leading front man.
The teenage years of the Smiths frontman are boiled down to a sentimental kitchen-sink drama that’s elevated by an honest performance from its lead.
England is Mine feels true to a certain type of self-flagellating artistic experience and Lowden is good at walking a sympathetic line between Morrissey’s passive, self-pitying narcissism and his sincere ambition to do something lasting in the world.
It is a suitably grey and gloomy portrait of the artist as a young man with an eclectic soundtrack and a plucky central performance from Dunkirk’s Jack Lowden.
This biopic of the embryonic Smiths singer is hamstrung without the music of the band.
Morrissey movie director: 'We don't want to upset him.'
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